


even though that would be easier

by lucy_is_a_rocketship



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Blood and Gore, Corpses, Gen, Horror, Nightmares, Sort Of, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-07
Updated: 2019-11-07
Packaged: 2021-01-24 17:49:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 680
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21342253
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucy_is_a_rocketship/pseuds/lucy_is_a_rocketship
Summary: "The world isn't going to end just because we've done everything wrong. Though, that would be easier. [oh fuck, we're doomed! quick! to the movie theatre!]" (A Softer World 318)Draco has a pre-time-travel nightmare as inspired by LullabyKnell's fic A New Beginning.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy & Narcissa Black Malfoy
Comments: 2
Kudos: 22





	even though that would be easier

**Author's Note:**

  * For [LullabyKnell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/LullabyKnell/gifts).

In his nightmares, blood dripped from Draco’s hands.

Sticky and warm, rivulets of it trickled over his wrists and down his fingers, fat droplets of it falling to the floor as he walked. He could feel it under his clothes, sliding over his skin and slowly staining him. His bare feet left dark footprints on the Manor’s cold wooden floor. He already knew not to check his body for wounds, his dream self wasn’t injured, the blood didn’t belong to him. The sound of movement and excited whispers drew him forwards.

As a child he had loved the Manor at night, the rusting of sleeping portraits, the sensation of his toes curling into soft, thick carpets, moonlight streaking through tall windows throwing light up at strange angles. If a window was left open some nights the wind would sing, softly around corners and under doors. Now, he hated it.

In life, while Voldemort had used the Manor as a base of operations, dust and debris had gathered on every surface and grime had begun to the windows so much that almost every room had been permanently dark. Now, Draco walked down the hall, past empty portrait frames and corpses lined up in two neat rows, marking his path. The bodies were grotesquely positioned, limbs askew, bones where they shouldn’t be. On some of them, the faces had been mutilated beyond recognition, but Draco knew them all the same. He’d watched them die.

He reached the entrance to the dining hall, but he could go no further, like an animal having found the glass wall of its' cage.

Inside a crowd had gathered, four concentric circles of looming figures in long black robes and skeleton-white masks. _No, no, please. It was a mistake._ Draco started to pound his fist against the barrier.

“Today you come to pledge your loyalty, your life, to me, to our cause Malfoy,” the Dark Lord’s voice rang out, high and cold, his words seemed to echo in the sudden quiet of the room. “Let us welcome our young Draco Malfoy into the fold. Kneel, child.”

Draco’s dream self could not interfere, could not save that stupid teenage boy. He screamed hoarsely and threw his shoulder against the dream constraints, bashing his hands against the invisible barrier, streaking it with blood. His younger self was hidden behind the sea of black robes but Draco did not need to see to know what was happening. The fear, the rolling nausea, the dizziness, his eyesight shifting in and out of focus. The searing pain as Voldemort pressed the cold tip of his wand into Draco’s wrist, black ink pooling out from that point of contact, moving under his skin until the Dark Mark formed.

_He’s a child! Don’t make him fight. Don’t make me … I don’t want to kill anyone._ A pair of the Death Eaters turned, Draco saw his mother's eyes widen behind her mask and his father’s furious glare. He scrambled forwards, desperate to tell them, to stop the ceremony. The floor gave way beneath him and he fell … _NO!_ Draco jerked forward with gasp. 

He was in his room in the manor, his childhood room in the east wing. He looked down, his hands were clean and small. All of him was smaller than it should have been, limbs dwarfed by the absurdly big bed he'd slept in at the manor, before the war. 

The room looked as though it come straight from his memories, dark wood furniture and Slytherin green accents against white walls. With trepidation he clambered out of bed.

Draco scrutinised the image in the mirror carefully. The reflection was standing in front of the full length mirror that had once stood by the eastern windows in the bedroom he had occupied as a child. _It must be a dream_, he stepped closer to the mirror, searching for an imperfection, a shimmer across the glass, some sign that this was a dream ... or a nightmare. But it looked perfect. His eleven year old face looked back at him.

Behind him the door opened.

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by LullabyKnell. Her fabulous time-travel fic A New Beginning from the perspective of Narcissa on the night Draco wakes as his older self in his younger body. He's super stressed and she, naturally, assumes that he's had a nightmare.  
It got me wondering what Draco Malfoy would have nightmares about. So this is a quick fic about the things that would haunt him. Draco, still being Draco, is both deeply regretful and self-centred.  
Anyway, tell me what you think!


End file.
